Six years after Akua Denteh was lynched, Ghana still has no law against witchcraft accusations

On 23 July 2020, 90-year-old Akua Denteh was beaten to death in Kafaba after being accused of witchcraft. Her killing caused national outrage. Six years later, Amnesty International says Ghanaian authorities have still failed to pass the Anti-Witchcraft Accusations Bill, leaving hundreds of accused people without protection.

Amnesty's research, published as 'Branded for Life', documents how accusations lead to banishment, violence, loss of property and confinement in the alleged witch camps of northern Ghana, overwhelmingly affecting older women and widows.

The women in these camps are not a folk story. They are citizens who lost their homes, their land and their families to an accusation no court ever tested. Their situation is a legal failure before it is a cultural one.